Product description

The classic Oscar Wilde story of the selfish giant who won't let anyone into his garden - until his heart is softened by one very special little boy, illustrated with great drama. The Bloomsbury Children's Classics Series: The Brave Sister, retold by Fiona Waters, illustrated by Danuta Mayer The Selfish Giant, retold by Fiona Waters, illustrated by Fabian Negrin The Emperor and the Nightingale, retold by Fiona Waters, illustrated by Paul Birkbeck Bisky Bats and Pussy Cats, animal nonsense poems by Edward Lear, illustrated by Matilda Harrison. The Nonsense Verse of Lewis Carroll, illustrated by Lorna Hussey

Author information

Fabian Negrin lives in Milan.

Editorial reviews

The 1888 classic illustrated in a more robust and detailed manner than Zwerger's misty, ethereal version (Picture Book Studio, 1984). Here the illustrator, whose work first appeared in Mary Pope Osborne's Moonhorse (Knopf, 1991) has chosen to depict a fully imagined world, complete with 19th-century period detail: children in caps and pinafores playing with hoops and sticks and marionettes; the giant toting his lute, portmanteau, and picnic basket; the Hail personified as a blind man in pantaloons and a hat straight out of Tenniel tapping with his umbrella on the roof slates. The palette is soft brown, green, peach, and gold; even the snow-and-ice scenes have a faint golden glow. The face of the little Christ-figure is never shown, preserving the mystery of the text. For all its period aura, Gallagher's style is distinctly modern, marked by the use of extreme high and low vantage points and seemingly random cropping, so that even important figures and objects may be cut off by the frame. The effect is somewhat like looking into a room through a keyhole; because the aperture is not large enough to encompass the entire scene, the result is an intense focus on that part of it that can be seen. Dramatic and memorable. (Kirkus Reviews)